President Trump’s recent war of words on supply management has emboldened several anti-Canadian farmer cheerleaders to emerge. Chief among them is Sylvain Charlebois who speaks from his comfortable bubble as the dean of the faculty of management at Dalhousie University.
Charlebois sounds like he comes from the past when he indicates that killing supply management would mean lower costs for consumers as competition increases.
What competition? Has he been living in a bubble and not seen what’s happening in the agricultural sector? Machinery dealers, chemical companies, fertilizer companies, and grain companies have all been consolidating down to two or three companies in the whole world. These companies are taking more money from both farmers and consumers. And yet there is not one peep from Charlebois on this “non-competitive” force, why is that?
This so-called expert suggests the ending of supply management is a good thing and yet Wisconsin farmers have clearly stated that the problem in the US is the overproduction of milk which drops the price farmers receive. And in order for the US farmers to stay in business they need government support from US taxpayers.
Canadian supply management insures enough milk is produced so the market is not shorted, consumers get a good product, farmers can make a decent living and the Canadian taxpayer does not have to provide any support.
Why would anyone want to give that away?
Is it just so some mega corporations could get into the business and skim money from farmers and consumers while providing lower quality products? Or is it so Professor Charlebois can export his fantasy of market competition and free trade from his ivory tower to the real world?
We all know how the Americans followed the free trade model of the WTO and COOL.
Checking the prices of milk one wonders why supply management can be the cause for excessive milk prices. A four-liter milk jug was priced between $6.40 and $4.63 per jug within a five km radius in Regina. Producers got the same price when they sold the milk, so why is there almost a 30 per cent discrepancy at the retail level between stores?
Obviously one of those stores is gouging their customers or the other store is using milk as a loss leader. Either way, if supply management was removed it is pure fantasy to think consumers would get cheaper milk.
Charlebois and others came from the archaic era where they believe that the theory of trickledown economics. It may sound good, but when powerful companies use their dominance of the market to take excess profits, they don’t trickle them down. They trickle them up to shareholders and farmers, consumers, and taxpayers get to work harder for less.
Kyle Korneychuk
